The problem is, as this article implies, Huawei has done nothing to speak out against Chinese government hacking and theft of intellectual property, which is both real and serious. In this, they have only themselves to blame. Obviously people are going to make a connection between state-sponsored hacking and Chinese-made telecom equipment, as unfair as that association may be. So why doesn't Huawei do anything about it?

Huawei should spend their entire PR budget on creating a joint venture with some major anti-virus company (Kaperksy, Norton, etc.), with goal of thwarting all hackers, regardless of origin or affiliation. Then, Huawei should work with Chinese police forces to bring some of these hackers to justice. It's incredible that with the dozens of governments and companies complaining about Chinese hackers, the Chinese government has done absolutely nothing to arrest hackers working within their borders.

To me, and the rest of the world, it looks like China condones this behavior. In many cases, it probably overtly supports it. Huawei could, and should take the lead in changing these attitudes. They have the influence and financial power to make it happen. Further, it would go a long way in proving their trustworthiness on the world stage, and the trustworthiness of all Chinese companies.

Until I see Huawei overtly lobbying the Chinese government to crack down on hackers (state-sponsored or otherwise), I have to assume they are complicit. Either they are helping the hackers themselves, or are not independent of the government.

Isn't it hypocrite, China itself is also a victims of Hacker from the west! Which world are you living in? The most advance technology is in American's hand. I worry more about US government's cooperation with Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft alike than Huawei, which it cannot really set its foot in USA.

Can you find one instance where China stopped hackers working in China? I've never seen this in Chinese news.

Plus I think China has a lot more to gain from hacking in the West. I am sure both China and the West hack each others' military and governments often, but I think only China hacks foreign corporations.

I heard that a Canadian Chinese stole Chinese oil company information and got caught and sentenced to 7 years (?).
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"China stopped hackers working in China"
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I think I heard of it a few years ago, and he was a young boy, was sentenced too. Of course American will hire the hackers to protect them from hacking. May be China should do so. I heard Russian and Iranian are very good at hacking. Why every hacking has to do with China, althought some said it came from China, but they are invisible and can be from everywhere.
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Think about it here:
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Buzzly wrote:
I don't normally write long comment but I break my own rule on this one. But the author of this lead article (may be unintentionally) continues the innuendo, falsehood, and fear against Huawei, therefore not giving the readers a better understanding of whole situation.
I am not defending Huawei and am in agreement that we have to we have to very careful when it come to national security.
My problem with is article.. For example:
“The founder Ren Zhengfei, who served as an engineer in the People’s Liberation Army” - As an engineer, who else would Ren Zhengfei worked for in a communist country. It is like saying a founder of a German company had ties to the Nazi party because he once was a member of Nazi Youth Party. Did he have any choice?
“But his company followed Mao’s strategy of using the countryside to encircle and capture the cities” Since when a company attacking the low-end market first and hopefully move up in the food chain is a Mao’s strategy? Which business textbook said that? Can we say a company directly attacking the core/upper-end markets is, say, a Stalin/Nazi strategy?
If the author had looked deeper into the communication stack, he would have known that Cisco owns 90% of the routers powering all the network/Internet in the world. The technologies to peep/inspect each IP packet were built-in from day-1. Companies use this technology to prioritize traffic flow (i.e. video stream over document) and US government uses it to eardrop in an un-marked building in SF (more on this later). Should we be concern about Cisco? Another dominate technology provider is Oracle that has 50+% share in the database market. All kind of business transactions/documents/whatever pass through or stored in these database. The founder of Oracle, Mr. Ellison, has shown fondness toward Japanese culture, is an avid practitioner of The Art of War, had buzzed the City of SF flying his Russian MiG-29 fighter jet, has just brought a private island in Hawaii close to US military base. Should we be concern about him?
BTW, ooriginally, four Network Access Point (NAPs) - in New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, and San Francisco - were created and supported by the National Science Foundation as part of the transition from the original U.S. government-financed Internet to a commercially operated Internet. Since that time, several new NAPs have been created. Up to 50% of all voice/internet traffic passes through these intersections. These NAPs are private or have been privatized. One of these owners was WorldCom- its founder is Canadian and is now sitting in jail.
Shouldn’t we be concerned about this?
The author did bring up a good point out: “The other reason for not banning Huawei is the dirty little secret that its foreign rivals strangely neglect to mention: just about everybody makes telecoms equipment in China these days.”
US law-makers are still making wave by stirring up the anti-Chinese sentiment. Case in point: US blocked the sales of 3-Com to Huawei. 3-Com, a US-registered networking veteran but losing out in the US market and transformed itself into a “Chinese” company. It products are made-in-China; 80% of the products are the low-end , home-bound wireless routers for the Chinese customers. Bain Capital brought a control-interest of this company and tried to flip the company to Huawei. US blocked the sales due to national security interest. Are you kidding me? There are NO functioning 3-Com routers in the US home.
I don’t know where I am going with this. But I do know that this article did not go deep enough to give the readers better understanding and a fair analysis.

Ummmm, because its wrong and dishonest maybe? Just because the US does it, it doesn't legitimise it. I hate how some posters always justify the bad things their government does by pointing out historic facts that this has happenned before. The US nuked two Japanese cities as well, will that make it OK for everyone else to do the same?

But who am I kidding, good guys finish last. So here we go again Cold War V2.0. I just hope it stays cold. China and the US can have their pissing contest. The money should be invested in education instead.

"However, there are clear differences between the two nations: Japan is free, and has a post-war constitution that was written to suit U.S. interests."

This fact hasn't stopped the Japanese (Toshiba) from selling a sophisticated milling machine to the Soviets circa 1987. My memory is spotty of that incident but the machine supposedly could have helped the Soviet Navy mill an ultra-quiet screw. It was thought that the Soviets had no such technology. American congressional representatives stood outside the capitol bashing on Toshiba products. It was a time when Americans were told that the Japanese played dirty with trade. A Norwegian comapny was also involved but I don't remember the Norwegians being scolded.

In any case, the PRC being "unfree" is to me pretty irrelevant. The PRC is not in the business of exporting any sort of ideology like the Soviets or the Comintern were. It is not in the business of exporting unfree-ness.

This is a case of national security. Pure and simple. The US spies on China and the Chinese do the same back. In fact, I remember hearing about the government (NSA?) approving some sort of encryption standard (DES) not for its reliability but rumour has it, that they designed a backdoor to the DES so that for everyone that uses it, the NSA simply has to apply the backdoor and they can read everything. The thing I don't get with China is that they are so technically capable but then the blow their cover by somehow leaking to the world about how bloody good they are (the Tibetan Government in Exile computers were compromised but was later exposed because of some clumsy warnings by Chinese officials to a European diplomat on information that the European diplomat didn't even have ... yet). If they have good working assets they really should learn to keep their mouths shut.

Yes, but if Japan doesn't want them there they are free to kick them out. Just like any other country which harbours US bases. And unfortunately it is none of China's business as it is the internal affairs of the country and the US. Nothing to do with you move on. Practice as you preach.

Its not the spying on each others governments that concerns me, it is the concerted effort to steal technology. We can expect a couple sources of ongoing friction, the most obvious is in governing philosophy (Democracy versus Communism) and in economic models (Capitalism versus State Capitalism). China spends considerably less on R&D than their trading partners leading one to suspect they will continue to rely on reverse engineering and theft for the bulk of their innovation.

'Yes, but if Japan doesn't want them there they are free to kick them out.'
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mine mine, another comedian waiting in the wing? and you want to run that line to the japanese?

japan today, despite its wealth and might, is 200 proof (or 100%) vassal state of the us and has been so for over 60 years. it does whatever the us orders it to do in major policies. any doubt of the us directives by japanese is quickly put down by japanese government. that's why they submitted in plaza accord, the joint exercises, etc. etc.

I don't think japan enjoys being occupied by the us, they probably hated it in the guts. but what can they do so long as the us is holding the leash.

hey, I am not against the us occupation of japan, it deserved it. for the dirty and criminal stuff they did during ww2 without repentance, they should or could be in 'prison' for another 100 years with the us holding tight the leash.

Believe what you wish, just because China would treat Japan that way doesn't mean the US does. Keep repeating it to yourself, the more you repeat the lie the more you will believe it. There are protests in Japan against the US bases all the time, it just has not reached a critical mass, one day it will and they will go. Just like they were kicked out from the Phillipines. I think two nuclear bombs was pretty good repentance or would you kill them all?

"Japan is absolutely not free. They can't even force the American soldiers out of Japan soil"

Well 9,000 Marines are being moved out of Okinawa. Otherwise the troop levels in Japan have declined over the years, since the 1970s.

The Fuchinobe base was closed in the seventies. The Sagamihara Depot is basically on a skeleton crew, and will have parts transfered over to the city of Sagamihara.

So a bit of a shopworned piece of Chinese propaganda. Maybe due to some sort of collective insecutiry?

Nevermind the Japanese may want the Americans considering the actions of N. Korea, as well as appearances of Chinese tolerance of N. Korean actions, and the behavior of the Chinese government concerning the Senkaku incident.

One reason why a X-band radar facility was opened up with a small number of Americans.

that 'japan is absolutely not free' is absolutely true. there are so many us military bases in japan that even the air headquarter of japanese self defense forces is located in a us base. the us hold and control of japan is quite complete and tight.

but ever an arrogant or 'proud' nation, that vassal status does not stop japan from trying to gain some breathing room from the us dominance.

under the pretext of supporting the us 're-entry' to asia pacific, japan has recently done a series of insidious scheming to poke wounds between china and the us, and between russia and china by trying to stirring up diaoyutai islands, urging on philippines, vietnam and india in south china seas, muddling foreign affairs of myanmar and mongolia, and issuing a very provocative defense white paper. all done to destabilise sino-american relation so that japan could exploit the hostilities flamed up among these major powers in a way it could win a chance to break away from the us choke hold and to be more independent.

such act is a high stack and high stake game. japan is seeking that chance however small of breaking free on the hide of not its own but the hide of the us, russia and china, as japan being a vassal really has nothing to lose---(from japan's perspective). all it takes is for either one of the three powers to blink, preferably the us, china and russia in that order.

you may have special sentiment with japan, I do too, but pearl harbour in 1941 was not just a piece of history, it's a case study of japanese tactical design and scheming par excellence. that's why the us is keeping japan on its toes and remaining vigilant there, ostentatiously in the name of guarding against n. korea and china.

and you can't blame japan for doing that, any defeated nation with hands tied would think in the same direction.

Okinawa is one prefecture of Japan. And actually I do discuss the bases with Okinawans; and it seems there is a strong constituency there that wants to see them go. I think I have said that before in prior posts. Reasons:
- True sense of pacifism/antimilitarism
- Tired of hosting an overconcentration of bases
- Worried about safety, with accidents and crime (although the crime rate may be lower amongst soldiers, families and contractors than teh general Okinawa populace)
- Interested in developing alternative industries, particularly hospitality, but maybe others (the Okinawa University there is big on ecology, oceanography, environmental sciences; there are traditional crafts)

Who knows, maybe there is Chinese money going into the activist groups/protest groups? I would do that if I were the CCP....

;-)

But many in the rest of Japan seem to like having the Americans there, in Okinawa (between them and China). Probably a more low key sentiment though than say the S. Korean government footdragging on keeping Americans at Iaewon, in Seoul as a tripwire.

On the mainland the main complaint is noise, like planes at Atsugi and Yokota, or helicopters from those places as well as Zama. Otherwise, they seemed quite appreciative of the Americans in helping with the earthquake.

Funny how certain Chinese posters get worked up if North Korea is described as a puppet or ally of China, but then they turn around and insult Japan as a vassal of the US? Or that seems to be the case. Just interesting....

The post comes off as a bit unclear and paranoic to be frank. So Jpan is unfree, but they are still able to undertake various machinations that will upset the balance of power in N. Asia?

Guess what, Japan is a sovereign country that is free and could go do what it likes. It could send the US troops packing tomorrow if it cared to, just like France did in 1966.

Take a look at N. Korea, with the erratic, opaque and at times visibly hostile leadership there - That alone could justify Japan wanting to continue close military relations.

You seem to steer away from that fact. Actually seems all of the "Japan is a vassal" crowd try to downplay the issue of N. Korea.

And judging from prejudiced, hostile posts by Chinese in the blogosphere, as well as behaviors around the Senkaku Islands, other incidents as well as the Chinese military buildup, could you blame the Japanese for possibly being wary of China too?

As mentioned in other posts, the US presence has actually trended downwards, and is expected to continue to do so. You have something like 40,000 troops and contractors; with 9,000 marines departing over the next 5 or so years.

As for the number of bases, it is really installations covering a range of functions (family housing, training, recreation, logistics, depots, communications, port facilities, barracks, airfields, air cargo terminals, just plain offices, etc.). The sites being separately counted inflate figures. By the way, almost all of those were former Japanese Imperial army and navy properties.

Didn't forget the tributary status of the Ryuukyuus. But that was changed by Satsuma clam domination starting in 1609 - A bit long off.

Otherwise, it was reorganized into a prefecture in 1879.

How would you know the Okinawans have good feeling for Mainland China after several hundred years? Or to take the prefecture reorg as a departure point, after 133 years passed?

There is an old wikileaks cable from six years ago on Okinawans not viewing China as a military threat. That is different from saying people are positive because they were once a tributary state.

Don't recall hearing pro-Chinese sentiments enunciated while there on visits (some mention of rumors of Chinese sub incursions though by dive masters). There was a small independence movement but not sure where that has gone..

Can't blame the current Diaoyu/Senkaku Islands on us - that is an issue to be resolved between Japan and China.

However, America did retain undisputed control of the area after WWII, when implementing the US military administration of Okinawa. Some Chinese claim the islands were to be handed over to China along with Formosa. Didn't happen, but then again, the war was largely won by America, and when it came to occupy Japan America called the shots (even Stalin recognized that).

How do you know N. Korea isn't an ally? Isn't the "Chinese North Korean Mutual Aid and Cooperation Friendship Treaty" still in effect technically after renewal in 2001?

What kind of material support do you think N. Korea receives from China?

Personally I could see N. Korea being a difficult, truculent and independent neighbor.

Why all the exclamation points? If you add in letters in CAPS the posts will look like something from a TEA party member....

"How would you know the Okinawans have good feeling for Mainland China after several hundred years?"

"Don't recall hearing pro-Chinese sentiments enunciated while there on visits"

Mr. Miyagi's ancestor, Shimpo Miyagi, in 1625 got drunk and drifted on his fishing boat to China. Ten years later he came back with a (Chinese) wife, two kids and the secrets to the Miyagi family Karate. So yeah, Okinawa is at least half Chinese by now. Also, Tokyo had tried to Japardize Taiwan and Korea when those were under Japanese control. It's likely that Okinawa was a lot more Chinese before the Satsuma clan took it over and brainwashed them into having at most ambivalent feelings about China. This is not unlike some in S. Korea and Taiwan.

In any case, most good things in Japan have Chinese origins but was never acknowledged. The Crane Stance/Kick Daniel LaRusso used to defeat Cobra Kai's Johnny was most definitely Chinese. Yet, everyone thinks it's Japanese...

Seems the Japanese were messing around down there since at least the 8th century...

Seems there had been some sharp divisions between different sets of islands.

Probably there is a good does of Chinese influence (thought more loan words too). Ryuukyuus were kind of a way station for trade between China and Japan, and a backdoor for the Satsuma when the Tokugawas closed Japan off from the world (primarily westerners).

However, the Satsuma pretty much conquered the place and ran the show from 1609 onwards

‘So Jpan is unfree, but they are still able to undertake various machinations that will upset the balance of power in N. Asia?’
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Exactly, japan is useful to the us in many ways and use it to do the dirty works in asia deemed unfit or beneath the dignity of the us to do in particular, as exemplified by the recent series of japanese provocations of china, s. korea and n. korea. that’s why it will keep japan collared so dearly.

Also, Ryuukyuus is not any part of japan or china. japan claimed it illegally. the us only gave japan management right to japan while japan itsef is under us occupation. Despite its close ties with china and japan historically, Ryuukyuus should be an independent nation. it’s a matter of records that Okinawans have been demonstrating for independence in recently years.

By the way, quit your bad habit of lumping every g.d. pro-chinese post together as some ‘Chinese propaganda’. you have got no right to say that. nobody is accusing you a mouthpiece of some Japanese adventurism or propaganda here either.

"ell that to the umpteen number of GI joes, carriers and military bases stationed in japan. they ain't there exactly for sun tanning you know."

I assume you are referring to American soldiers stationed in Japan, which do not get involved in the domestic affairs of Japanese civil society. Moreover, goodwill was increased after the 2011 tsunami and earthquake when these "sun tanning" helped with humanitarian aid.

In the final analysis, the very fact that the Japanese are able to debate and openly criticize the presence of American troops on their soil points to the fact that Japan is indeed free. At least more so than China, Russia, North Korea, Venezuela.

Many folks have made a big deal about American soldiers, while I was more focused on civil society, civil liberties, and the right to conduct business without concern of pervasive surveillance by a business partner.

And on the hacking, just look to Google: the Gmail accounts of several dissidents were compromised, and around that time Google switched all Mandarin users over to their uncensored Hong Kong site.
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Google has NO spine! Now they behave like a hungry prostitute!
:D :D :D
I had hoped that they stayed away from China. So Baidu can replace them totally.

Hate to break it to you, the Ryuukyuus are part of Japan. Trying to push imperalist Chinese propaganda about how "Okinawa was once ours" based on past tributary status?

Seems that has cropped up over the past two or so years.

If you are worried about being lumped in as a propagandist, then don't push a bunch of obnoxious bunk, like blanket statements about Japan not being a free country despite all evidence to the countrary and trends in political development and policies.

Otherwise, I see this topic has really drifted away from the the point of the article, about Huawei.

But if obnoxious posts and arrogance by "pro-chinese" elements in forums were a consequential indicator, then yes, maybe people should be worrying about Huawei?

"Its not the spying on each others governments that concerns me, it is the concerted effort to steal technology."

Theft of technology is not as clearcut as people would have you believe. You take the Apple versus Samsung show and you wonder if frivolous lawsuits constitute legitimate business strategy.

I once moonlighted as an engineering consultant. Circa the mid-90's Taiwanese companies had a simple strategy. It worked like this: chip makers, usually US companies would design chipsets that worked together to perform certain functions. Things such as GPS, WiFi, mobile phones, even digital displays were made from chipsets. They were complete solutions and the companies that designed them published reference designs that showed how the chips were to be used together. Taiwanese companies and US companies with Taiwansese founders simply copied the reference designs and turned them into intermediate and finished products as was intended by the chip makers.

Garmin for isntance made consumer nav devices as well as board products that other companies could buy and build stuff around. There is an open source project where people could build 2G GSM base station. It's called Open BTS. I think there may be upgraded versions by now. Essentially you could have used OpenBTS and go to Africa and set up their mobile phone networks just using that stuff. If you add a little R&D using competent engineers to add features such as billing info, etc. you would have created a unique business.

There is no theft if used in that way. BTW networking equipment can also be made that way. It's very easy to do. Even the Cisco lawsuit against Huawei wasn't even about the core technology, it was about how Huawei's products could be programmed and modified using Cisco commands. In fact, I think it's a good idea to standardise programming and command line interface. But Cisco thinks otherwise. I think Android phones should have the same interface as the iPhone ones. This would be good for consumers.

"China spends considerably less on R&D than their trading partners leading one to suspect they will continue to rely on reverse engineering and theft for the bulk of their innovation."

This is not exactly true. Several Japanese and US companies used open source Linux projects and modified them into finished products. In fact Android was built on open source stuff and itself is open source. I believe engineers who work on open source projects get hired by companies to turn their projects into marketable devices. As of now, there seems to be nothing in the way of IP that Huawei has stolen.

"And on the hacking, just look to Google: the Gmail accounts of several dissidents were compromised, and around that time Google switched all Mandarin users over to their uncensored Hong Kong site."

And here's the problem: Someone's dissident is another's subversive. It is often not so black and white. People in China often point out, to me, at least, that there are many more pro-democracy, pro-citizen's rights, pro-human rights advocates that are quietly working within the system to effect changes. Someone I pegged to be a rabid China nationalist actually said (hopefully this little comment won't put him in danger) that Wen Jiabao was such a person -- he said it in an almost admiring way. In fact the more flamboyant, loud, and dramatic ones often set the progress toward a more open China back, he said. At least that's the contention. And I think he has a point.

Basically, I think China is a national security state much like Truman's but magnified 10 maybe 50 times because they have a painful, modern-era history to point to as evidence. Whether that history is still relevant or not doesn't matter. It's what the people perceive. China as a national entity doesn't react well to scoldings, lectures, or even condescending praises. If we are truly in favour of a more open China (and I think we should, after all how can be keep one-fifth or one-sixth of humanity down?), we should quietly help the likes of Wen.

The way I see it, China's rise is inevitable. The West should be on the good side of China not by acquiescing to its every whim, not by being adverserial in every major way, but by finding common ground and workings those common goal. The benefits should accrue, though not in four-year election cycles.

Moreover, fear of societal instability and chaos are part of the Chinese mindset. China went through a busing civil war only 60 or so years ago, had the Great Leap Forward, Cultural Revolution, Tiananmen Square, etc. Add this on to the fear of chaos that goes back centuries in Chinese civilization. When given a choice between tyranny and chaos, people generally chose the former. Not always the right choice, and nor is it always a real choice, but it is an understandable direction.

"The Okinawans speak a Japanese dialect. Others would say the Ryukyuan languages fall under the Japanese (Japonic) family of languages."

I'm a little surprised that the Japonic family of languages has more than one member. I was once persuaded that the Japanese were so unique and special that they didn't have peers and that no other language came close to having any relationship with Japanese.

Incidentally what we know as the Satsuma Tangerine is originally from a Chinese cultivar. But the history is convoluted (perhaps with Japanese WW II propaganda) enough that some claim that the Chinese got theirs from Japanese cultivars. I was once astonished to find a claim that soy sauce was a Japanese invention -- the convolution went like this: some Japanese monk went to China and learned to brew a version of soy sauce. But when he returned to Japan, he "completely" invented a new sauce, "completely" unrelated to the Chinese sauce he learned to brew, using "completly" different techniques. Whatever that means. Therefore soy sauce is a Japanese invention. This and many other stories I've heard sound utterly revisionist to me. I think it has a lot to do with WW II and pre WW II propaganda in Japan in trying to create a mythology of Japanese civilisation as having originated a lot of things that clearly came from China -- I once told a Japanese colleague that shabu-shabu had its originas in Mongolia and he found the idea impossible. This has something to do with that idea of Japanese being a divine pure race or something like that. There's a good chance the Ryukyuu is in fact more Chinese that Japanese...

That could happen. Or some permutation of protectionism and/or xenophobia in various polities.

Look at the end of the 1870s (with Germany particularly, but also the US); as well as scares over Germany in the UK in the 1890s; as well as the end of WWI and the rise of autarky; a well as the spread of communisms following both world wars; etc.

Why does US and other western countries can block Huawei? Because they can afford to do so! It's that simple! Does China have any concern about the security issues from Boeing 787 or Airbus 380? You bet! But where else can they turn to outside of these two juggernauts?

Another reason is that China is a net export country. And net export country always have more to lose if engaging in a trade war! Yes, a trade war will inflict damage on both sides, but the damage is just bigger on China's side. That is the second reason for Huawei to bear all this extra burden US laid on it.

Well, what will this mean to Huawei? Switching shoes, if you were Huawei, you will try to improve further, invest in R&D and management, make your products even better and cheaper. Chinese has a proverb saying that "Treat pressure as motivation". If global environment has been friendly to Huawei, it would never achieved what it had today.

On ther other hand, protectionism will provide a false comfort to domestic manufacturers, and gradually they will fall even further behind. All protection measures have a limit, by the time the limit is breached, these domestic manufacturers will face an even mightier opponent that has leapfroged them in both product functionality and price. By then, everything is too late.

In conclusion, competition is the only way to prosperity. You are USA, you thrive on this, what do you have to be afraid of! The country was founded on competiting to win, not hiding behind curtain and beggeing Uncle Sam.

now you are talking. hit the spot too. on his 100th anniversary, milton friedman would have agreed some of what you posted.

and did plato used to say, 'after over population, the second reason for war is foreign trade with disputes that interrupt it, so that every precaution must be taken to avoid the occasions of war' ?

there's no telling who would come out as the clear winner for any war, including the war of us invasion to grenada years and years ago (the us did of course win over that tiny nation of 100,000 population).

so let's not interrupt foreign trades for some silly reasons of protectionism.

I agree, the first thing the US should do is artificially make the US dollar as low as possible, completely disregard the environment, throw occupational safety out the window, and finally make any business which wants to manufacture or sell in the US be 51% US owned. Sound fair?

In China, we don't buy huawei‘s cellphone.In our mind, it steps into the industry of phone only about 5 years, at least I get to know this brand of cellphone a few years ago for its low price. Its cellphone has not strong edge to compete with Sumsang, Iphone or Mango, etc.

I heard Huawei has not yet been a quoted company, so it has many mysteries for us to spy into. I know it gets a strong support from Chinese government, it is not easy for him to be openness.

You don't need to be a Chinese to comment here, absolute not.
Huawei's strong at cheap good smartphone. They even sell in EU at our discount supermarket! And made it for another brand name (sell as foreign products) !

Of course Huawei is not in the same league of Sony, Samsung and Apple, it is also not their intention for this higher market. African are happy with Huawei cellphone and smartphone.

well, you are "legally" not a chinese? ok, if you can see what i write here: “你要么是一个假洋鬼子，要么是移民一族，没什么好仇视中国的。 如果你想继续装孙子下去，随便吧，这里的评论不需要一种自我高尚的民族自豪感，只是就事论事。在国外您生活的很好的话，我恭喜您，如果不如意，我们欢迎您海龟，国门永远会向您敞开“。 so it is, you were a chinese "before" ,then you can know these extremely sophisticated chinese characters.

I know! You are so right, human rights and democracy are soooo yesterday. /s Do you hate everyone who isn't Chinese or is it just white people? Westerners is such a broad term, are Africans included in that as they are west of China? Is it because of your inferiority complex? Should the evil Westerners censor their publications so as not to discuss the "peaceful" rise of China, so as not to offend the sensitive Chinese? The USA has been bashed for years, they roll with it, is seems China has a lot to learn with regards to taking crisitsm, better get used to it there is much more coming.

I wonder what happens when there is nothing left to steal, and China has caught up, will the innovation just stop? I mean after Cisco and the like go bankrupt, and the great Chinese monopolies take over, then what? I guess hacking as a profession will come back to the US. Then the Chinese will start sueing for IP theft.

I wonder what happens when there is nothing left to steal, and China has caught up, will the innovation just stop? I mean after Cisco and the like go bankrupt, and the great Chinese monopolies take over, then what? I guess hacking as a profession will come back to the US. Then the Chinese will start sueing for IP theft.
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For all these years You guys critcizing China this and that, and China in fact following your footstep (CopyCat). And you are not happy, "may be" China will sue you Guys for IP theft one day.

I know it is crazy those crazy barbarians just copy everything. Sorry just remind me, who did the west copy airplanes from, penecillin, internet, large hadron collider, telescopes, microscopes, computers, microchips, refridgerators, microwave ovens, I dunno its just crazy isn't it!

You guys copy from each other!! A great industrial revolution is just a big CopyCat and repeating innovation, China is simply continue this trend and make it cheaper for every one to enjoy a cheap happy life. And that bother you!! :D

What steam engines were the Qing chinese working on in the 18th century that the British copied?
That was the essence of the industrial revolution.
As for other luxury goods - there was copying, like Delft China. Maybe the British took a bunch of ideas about furniture making. What percentage of the economy did these sectors comprise? Doubt it was too large (most people were still rural, into farming in the 18th century).
Maybe copying opium cultivation techniques from the Chinese (who used the the stuff since the 15th or 16th centuries). Don't know, but maybe worth a look.
Considering these events took place over two hundred years ago, seems they are thin on relevance and a bit off topic.

Certain projects are highly subsidized by the Chinese government or various state entities, in particular, infrastructure projects in Africa, which are sometimes given away for free (told to me by a Huawei employee) and paid for completely by the Chinese government, in return for trade/strategic/resource concessions.

Right, I am working in the industry and know that too well.
A similar strategy has been taken in other markets as well, no manager of a telecom operator can refuse an offer for free equipment... any concern on quality or security fades away.

And strangely enough Huawei selects strategic markets on a political base, not on which makes business sense.

Chinese company act strategically helped by a government providing them with political backing and free financing, something that it's rather unusual to say the least for a private company. No Ericsson can offer zero interest rate financing for projects of hundreds of millions USD over several years.

You guys just don't think far enough, China investors are investing for a long perspective. Not like the western investors just dig somewhere, and left when the resources price drop.

Your AID to Africa did not bring anything to African people, you need to give them a job, let them work, not just improve health and Aids. The priority is they can stand on their own feet, not feeding them in a refugee camp. BTW 80% of all these western AID did not go to African countries but your own pocket---management and controlling.

Yes, may be the western world were cruel to them, only giving them health---Aids prevention, health and hygiene etc. When they have a job and make enough money, their children can go to school, they can also have higher living standard than before. They can buy more food, better food so they are strong and be healthier. Why they need your help---Hygiene, Aids, feeding them in a refugee camp..etc.

When they earn money they can do whatever they want. When the African government open the market for foreigner to invest, road, school, water supply etc will follow. Just make sure the investment companies do these for you.

Why can't you give me reason of your objection. Our German government admitted that our fund to African countries brought nothing to them, but just bureaucratie and waste resource.

"When you want to talk, go for western countries, when you want things done go for China."

A few years ago Huawei was well known for providing telecom equipment "just like Cisco's" but a hell of a lot cheaper. Everyone in the sector knows they did this by reverse engineering what Cisco and other prominent telcos did and using their cheap labour to bring down costs. Probably breaking a few international IP laws but that's what you get with a government that picks and chooses what's legal and not. Plus (in Cisco's case) you're not going to go to the biggest market in the world and risk the communist party banning you from selling in it.

I'm surprised nobody mentioned the extent of back-door security invasions in the US, including the government, and that hardware was all installed by firms from Israel.

Bill Clinton was on record as having stated his certain belief that the White House was totally tapped, and various US enforcement agencies claimed that back doors in most US major telephone systems had been installed and were in frequent use for espionage. And that was all telecom equipment from Israel.

Here is a quote from a recent article:

"Washington's Government Accountability Office (GAO) said Israel "conducts the most aggressive espionage operation against the United States of any US ally."

The Pentagon accused Israel of "actively engag(ing) in military and industrial espionage in the United States. An Israeli citizen working in the US who has access to proprietary information is likely to be a target of such espionage."

"FBI whistleblower John Cole said Justice Department officials ordered dozens of Israeli espionage cases dropped. At issue was political pressure."

How is it that the Israeli espionage threat in telecom hardware always seems to escape full public airing even when extensive proof exists?

And how is it that China seems to always garner the accusations when no proof has ever existed?

What kind of irrelevant comment is that? Israel has no need to 'threaten' the US, since Israel controls US foreign policy and uses the US military to attack its enemies while Israel remains the shadow puppeteer.

And China's military is far from a match for the US, a fact you must be aware of. US military expenditures are almost 65% of the world total while China's is around 7%. Some competition.

Why do you insist, like all Hasbara posters, in inserting total irrelevancies and outright factual lies, instead of addressing the facts of a situation?

Israel's IT espionage is real, and it's pervasive. Nothing to do with military strength.

Your nonsense comment tells us that the Jewish media don't report Jewish IT and communications espionage because Israel isn't militarily strong enough to attack the US.

while claiming high quality and low price TE has failed to mention the wrench of financing deals that accompany the HW march towards market leadership as well as ignored trouble hw networking equipment is causing. it is indeed interesting to see that hw actually uses propaganda to fight its competitors. in general typical TE article - some substance so that it looks credible at least on the face of it.

"Westerners fret that the networks the firm is building are used by Chinese spooks to eavesdrop during peacetime and could be shut down suddenly during wartime." - Honestly, the only way to probably deal with this would be to source raw materials and manufacture everything locally. Not only is that not always practically feasible, it is uneconomical for them, and hence will not be done. Even if everything were manufactured within the country, I am certain these 'cyber-experts' could cause havoc, even then.

Considering this, and the fact that people's information is being sold to everybody, what really is 'safe' anymore?

I like the solutions proposed by the writer. As always it takes two to tango. It's fine if the US government wants to closely scrutinize foreign telcom firms for security reasons, but we must do so fairly across the board not just against one country, and if Huawei wants to allay suspicion, they must do their part and operate in a more open book environment by adhering to US accounting standards.

Congratulations to Huawei now that “Huawei has just overtaken Sweden’s Ericsson to become the world’s largest telecoms-equipment-maker” according to this article.

Yes, “It commands respect by delivering high-quality telecoms equipment at low prices” and Huawei’s cheap but effective equipment helped making India’s and Africa’s mobile-telecoms revolution possible and that much sooner.

Yet, like the 17 year old Chinese athlete Ye Shiwen who set world records and won gold medals on heretofore West dominated sports of Womenʼs 200m Individual Medley and Womenʼs 400m Individual Medley in the 2012 London Olympic Games where typical reaction from the West press was disbelief, doubts and innuendos instead of level minded praise, Huawei’s rise on telecom equipment market scene has been “similarly” greeted with suspicion, defamation and protectionism to the core.

Of many excuses for fear of benefiting a Chinese firm, a most laughable one is the issue of "security". People in the business ought to know that information content security measures (e.g., encryption, authentication, etc.) should be transparent to and independent of the transmission network system that does the transporting of the information content data. It’s pure buck passing and self-interest playing to lay info-content security blame to the transmission media (Huawei’s network gear in this case). It simply makes no physical sense to the professionals of this field.

And nobody in the West raised the issue of security when Microsoft garnered over 95% of commercial operating system market in China either.

Americans are usually proud of their employee being veterans who have done their duty serving their nation and got honorable discharge, including their US Presidents. I can appreciate that foreign firms being barred from bidding government classified programs or “Buy American” sanctioned projects. But it's far fetched to extend that to commercial open tenders. There’s little ground to make any issue out of Huawei’s founder Ren Zhengfei who served as an engineer in the People’s Liberation Army (PLA), i.e. a veteran.

And “Western governments are also suspicious of the subsidies, low-interest loans and generous export credits lavished on favoured champions, including Huawei”, what’s wrong with all that if indeed they are done within the rule of WTO. Did Boeing and Airbus receive massive subsidies from thier government? Did GM and US banks get huge bailout funds from the US treasury chest? Even if at their very worst, is it pot calling kettle black by the West? I mean for example, have you seen how bullying and downright "ugly" the US government has recently fought for and forced down their throats of American beef import to S. Korea, Taiwan and Japan? (Well, you dont' really want to know.)

If the West and developing countries like India truly believe what they preach about free market and level playing field, they should act like it too. It’s good sportsmanship not to engaging undue blocking of Huawei’s market entry to fair competition, at least not anymore.

Outstanding comments, nkab. You have thoroughly exposed the biased agenda professed by rival companies and countries. At the same time, hypocratic views of western press (as you showed with the examples of the Chinese athelete and indeed Huawei)is clearly over the top.

It is not just censorship in Google's case, with Google Maps being blocked in addition to Google+ etc. Google services in general are slowed down and timed out in order to increase market share for Baidu.

Right so back in the 70's and 80's when a large percentage or telecom equipment was made in the west installed almost everywhere no one complained about western companies their unfair practices and the security treat of using their equipment! When the CIA installed Xerox Printers in the foreign embassies to spy on them, when Motorola would produce telecom networks with a back door to the Echelon system that where installed worldwide, when we would bribe any government western or not to buy our products instead of their own national products! (Italy, Belgium, and Germany with the Lockheed F104!) I could list a 100 more.. But it's evident that there is a definite double standard, now that it's China we all have to worry!! I see the Chinese doing exactly what the US/West did to the rest of the world in the past!
They say that Imitation is the highest form of flattery! So we should feel flattered by China's behavior no?
Oh and no I am not a Chinese toll, for the most part I don't agree with China on much! In Fact I am American, but not one blinded to facts by jingoism and ignorance of history!

No one complained because they did not have a choice. Motorola and Ericsson of the world were the only ones who could build a telecom gear at that time. So other countries took a risk because they had no choice. US now has a choice and can continue to buy gears from Motorola and Ericsson.